Chapter 293: Interlude Pt. 1: Talga's Study

I’ll state the conclusion first. Talga was excellent. No, I thought he would be excellent from the start. After all, he is a person entrusted with an important defense base by His Majesty. He surely isn’t just excellent in martial valor.

Of course, if I were to quantify his ability values, the ratio would probably be Magic: 30, Swordsmanship: 50, Noble Power: 10, and Lord Power: 10, but even so, his comprehension is higher than I thought. No, if asked what “Lord Power” is, I couldn’t answer, though.

“Lord Van, why did you arrange these facilities in this manner?”

“This? I was conscious of the flow of people and logistics.”

“Flow, is it?”

Talga ruminated on part of my words while gazing at the Seatoh Village tourist map. Recently, partly due to the war with the Kingdom of Yelenetta, many peddlers, people from noble families, and knight orders have visited the village from afar, so I made a Seatoh Village guide map for the future. There is also a cute, deformed illustration of an apkallu child drawn in the upper left.

Pointing at that map, I simply explained the structure of the village.

“The lord’s manor is in the center, and first, shops and inns are concentrated around the castle gate, which faces the highway. Since there are materials and resources from magical beasts hunted by adventurers in the Wolfsbrook Mountain Range, I also placed large warehouses near the entrance/exit. After that, I placed related residences and warehouses behind the shops and inns, and across the road, there are districts for blacksmiths, carpenters, tailors, and so on. Moving further back, there are the dwarf furnaces. On the opposite side, there are residential districts where the residents live, and I created a large lake in the back to prepare for drought as well.”

“You made a lake as well?”

“Yes, that’s right. Since the apkallu said they wanted to live there, I went out of my way to build houses that boats can enter.”

“I see… It is the same with the dwarf furnaces, but by preparing what the residents desire, you achieved this rapid development…”

“Eh? What they desire…”

I inadvertently tilted my head at Talga’s impressed line. Come to think of it, I feel like I’ve been making various things just as I was told, “I want this, I want that.” I might be spoiling the territory’s people too much. Now that I think about it, even though I feel the standard of living has become richer than the Royal Capital, the taxes remain reduced. Or rather, the tax payment from the Bell & Rango Trading Company is so large that I forgot about it.

Thinking about it, I realize now that the standard of living in Seatoh Village is outrageous.

First, if you reside permanently in Seatoh Village, housing is free. A house is built for each household, and furniture and daily goods are also sold at bargain prices by the Bell & Rango Trading Company. If they want to buy something a little better or rare, there are sales from the Mary Chamber of Commerce and the Merchant Guild. Clothing is the same.

Furthermore, minimum food items are also sold at bargain prices. High-class ingredients are probably considerably cheaper than in other territories too. Moreover, a barbecue party is held at a pace of about once a month, where they can enjoy high-class meat, bread, fruit wine, and the like for free.

If I were to add one more thing, they don’t struggle for jobs either. There are plenty of territories boasting unemployment rates that are dangerous, but in my Seatoh Village, we are troubled by a lack of manpower. Including the Adventurer Town, the population has expanded to the scale of four thousand people, but the number of people in the Chivalric Order is insufficient, and the number of merchants in the Bell & Rango Trading Company is completely insufficient. No, it feels like the Bell & Rango Trading Company is self-destructing on its own, but even though they are rapidly hiring people who can calculate or have merchant experience, it is completely insufficient.

Well, now the Bell & Rango Trading Company operates four large stores and two inns in Seatoh Village, and similarly operates four stores and two inns in the Adventurer Town. From now on, they must also operate one store each in Fortress City Murcia and Fortress City Cayenne. Since they also purchase materials, they also need clerks who can carve up magical beast materials.

Rather, the question becomes whether there are enough customers for opening so many stores, but many peddlers and adventurers are visiting Seatoh Village, whose name recognition is currently skyrocketing. Even workers in primary industries, which are said to be the least profitable, are becoming short-staffed. Well, in Seatoh Village’s case, since we conduct everything from harvesting to processing and sales in one organization called the Agricultural Guild, the part where primary industry workers earn income equivalent to merchants is significant.

If income is solid and stable, and furthermore, the more they produce the more it sells, they would want to work even sweating blood and tears. However, job seekers aren’t coming that much.

The reason is that other jobs are also short on people. Blacksmiths and carpenters are short on people, and even tailors and restaurant staff are lacking. Actually, we are posting job offers not only for guards and the Chivalric Order but also for cleaners to maintain the scenery, but not many are coming for those either.

No, thinking about it that way, it might be quite a harsh environment.

Looking back at the lives of the residents currently living in Seatoh Village, I reconsidered. After all, the busyness is on par with a black company. Thinking about it that way, it can be said that being able to live a rich life proportional to the busyness is fair.

“…Everyone in Seatoh Village is working very hard, you see. Since they work desperately every day, I want to at least make things that make everyone happy.”

When I said that with deep feeling, Talga opened his eyes wide and nodded repeatedly.

“…I see. That is your feeling as a lord, Lord Van. It was a good lesson. I shall also devote myself without forgetting that feeling.”

Talga nodded with a serious face saying that. Well, if it became a lesson for him, I suppose I should think it was good.